Thursday, March 24, 2011

Mubarak’s fortune hunt : Time means money

The EU foreign ministers decided on March 21st in Brussels to freeze the bank accounts of Mubarak in Europe. Of course our media cheered for this important decision and is starting to ask how we can get this money back. This is a correct question but we should not ask this question only because there is other even more important question we should ask : Why did this decision take that time ??
Hosni Mubarak stepped down on February 11,2011 and after half an hour of that important decision Switzerland decided to freeze the Mubaraks’ bank accounts. If you remember the decision was announced on the national TV at 6:07 PM Cairo local time which means 6:37 PM Cairo local time the Swiss authorities issued its historical decision which we will never forget.
On February 14 the Egyptian government sent its first official request to the EU countries regarding Mubarak’s top official assets including bank accounts. On February 14th France stated that the Egyptian government asked it to freeze top Egyptian officials’ bank accounts whom Mubarak was not among them. On February 15 UK announced that its SOCA would investigate the UK based banks for Mubarak’s accounts even thought it was not officially addressed according to what I found. Here is a list of those Egyptians’ whose assets currently Frozen in UK anyhow.

Till March 20th the EU was busy with Libya to discuss Mubarak’s banks’ accounts freeze decision according to the president of EU parliament Jerzy Buzek in Cairo last Sunday at a press conference !!?
On March 22nd ironically when the German FM Westerwelle arrived to the EU meeting in Brussels he was asked by the journalists if freezing the Mubaraks’ bank accounts would on the agenda and he answered that he was not actually aware of that !! Anyhow thankfully they reached to decision and now Mubaraks’ assets are being frozen in 27 EU countries !!
I do not get that delay , seriously I do not understand it. The decision of freezing Mubarak’s assets do not need that time , already the decision of freezing Qaddafi’s assets was taken in less than a week for God sake !!
Germany said that it waited all that time because the BKA there was examining the money of the Mubarak clan was invested in Germany and was possibly involved in money laundry.
The electronic transfer of money does not take more than more one hour. I will not speak about red tape that the EU countries need an official request from country x so they can discuss and investigate it for days because in Switzerland did not need that time neither France or UK.
I hope that the EU should take our side as Egyptian people and be transparent enough to the level of announcing all the facts directly in official statements. Anyhow now the EU took this decision ,We should start ask these questions now :

How much have the Mubaraks got in their EU banks accounts ?

How many bank accounts do they have in the EU countries ?

What about other assets in the EU ? The buildings the Mubaraks own across Europe ?

How much money was transferred in to and from these bank accounts before and after January 25 ?

How much money was transferred from these accounts starting from February 11th ?

Where did this money go ? The EU can help us with its money laundry tracking systems to know where the money went. They owe it for us in front of this delay.

I do not have to tell you again that there is a strong rumor that the Mubaraks transferred their bank accounts to banks in UAE and KSA.
Moving from EU to the States and Mubarak’s assets there. I do not understand this gaffe by John Kerry , in fact I do not get how a senator like John Kerry makes this mistake in public and then to correct it in this way. Anyhow we already know that Alaa Mubarak got a house in LA , this is something for sure.
It is not longer a confidential matter because now we are dealing with the billions of Egyptian people. These are not the billions of Mubarak nor his family , he was truly honest hard working man along his his sons he would not have these billions. The salary of president in Egypt does not make you a billionaire I am afraid.
Now I will raise the bar and say that we should ask the League of Arab states to adopt a similar resolution imposed on all its members regarding the Mubaraks and Ben Alis’ assets and bank accounts. I know I am asking the impossible already but I hope Amr Moussa used it in his presidential campaign.
The Mubaraks’ wealth abroad only can help not to ask the aid from anyone , the world has to stand with us and if the Egyptian government or the AFC are late in asking for our money , it should not wait for them and declare it right away.
I really thank our dear friend Jens from Germany who was kindly enough to bring this to my attention. German TV Ch.1 discussed that matter on March 21st, you can read and see the report in German.
I am still insisting on the need of this committee to restore our assets abroad.
By the way I do not overestimate the wealth of Hosni Mubarak and his family because of the following :

It is not the wealth of Hosni Mubarak alone but rather the the assets of Hosni Mubarak, Suzanne Thabet , Alaa and Gamal Mubarak as well aside from their wives.

Alaa and Gamal were not in to a military world but rather in business world.

The brothers used to take a percentage from profits from successful companies in Egypt whether from local or foreign companies agents in all kinds of businesses. We are speaking of 100 millions per year.

Alaa Mubarak was found to own over LE 49 million of shares in Palm Hills company , this is of course besides the role he played to get this huge piece of land in 6th of October for technically nothing for SODIC !! Ironically SODIC is owned by Magdy Raskh, his father in-law while Palm Hills development’s board includes Gamal Mubarak’s father in-law !!

It turned out that Alaa used his legal name Alaa Mohamed Hosni El-Sayed in his legal and financial transaction so I will assume that Gamal Mubarak used the same trick. Gamal El-Din Mohamed Hosni El-Sayed , keep that name in your mind.

No comments
:

Post a Comment

Thank You for your comment Please keep it civilized here , I will not tolerate any insult in my blog or any racist or hateful commentThe Comments in this blog with exclusion of the blog's owner do not represent the views of the blog's owner